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Waiting on the next wave of longtime mentors

By Mike Brohard

Posted:
07/04/2011 11:28:15 PM MDT

The games have not changed.

The requirements to get them played are another story, and that has changed the landscape of coaching at the high school level. For the coaches, it's not just about the X's and O's, checking in and out equipment and making sure their athletes have turned in their paperwork on time. Those things have always been part of the job description. But in the past decade -- really, a bit longer -- the job has become less seasonal and more of a yearlong process.

Fall athletes don't just check in when the calendar flips to August. There are team camps, open gyms and spring drills. Then there's the cross-checking between coaches who deal with multi-sport athletes, making sure schedules are clear for their talents to be available to each of their teams. But the most taxing aspect of it all has become fundraising.

When fundraising first came to the forefront, back in the early 1990s, it was clear many coaches weren't thrilled about the added investment -- financially and time wise. They weren't happy, and their families weren't happy. Change is tough on its own. It becomes harder still when it is abrupt and swift. So many just turned in their whistles. It was too much.

Those of us who have been around a while can remember the time when coaches were as much a part of the landscape as the teams they ran. And those coaches are hard to find these days. John Poovey, who has since retired from teaching, has coached football at Loveland closer to four decades than three. Take a look around, and you won't find many like him. But back when he was in his second decade, there were many others who had been around longer. The reality today is, you'll find very few who have guided their teams in the district for even a decade.

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The list is short. Wendy Thompson and Doug Schneiter at Loveland join Poovey; Scott Pickert and Dan McGinn down in Berthoud; Dave Hunn and Scott Barker at Mountain View; and Jan Wall and Bryon Rutherford at Thompson Valley. Roosevelt just watched the two most tenured coaches at the school -- Mike Pallotto and Ed Eastin -- retire at the end of the school year.

It isn't because coaches no longer hold onto the passion of coaching and molding young athletes. But their job is more taxing than ever. Face it, high school coaches aren't in it for the money. And if they're smart, they never try to break down their pay per hour.

Too painful.

Yet as times change, so do outlooks. Most of today's high school coaches don't remember the day when students didn't pay fees and extra money wasn't needed. To that end, the extra duties to earn extra-duty pay aren't as foreign or unexpected. Jay Denning knows his job as Thompson Valley's baseball coach is different than when his dad, Ron, held the same post for two decades. The same goes for Bart Mayes, the Mountain View football coach who played for his dad, Tom, at Thompson Valley. But they knew it going into their posts.

Times change, and things work in cycles. Going in knowing fundraising and the other little extras are what it takes to make a program successful and sustaining may just mean some of the new breed of today's coaches may someday be looked at as long in the tooth.

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